Enhancing Governance for Environmental Sustainability in Sub-Saharan Africa

Abstract

This study assesses whether improving governance standards affects environmental quality in 44 countries in sub-Saharan Africa for the period 2000-2012. The empirical evidence is based on Generalised Method of Moments. Bundled and unbundled governance dynamics are used notably: (i) political governance (consisting of political stability and "voice & accountability"); (ii) economic governance (entailing government effectiveness and regulation quality), (iii) institutional governance (represented by the rule of law and corruption-control) and (iv) general governance (encompassing political, economic and institutional governance dynamics). The following hypotheses are tested: (i) Hypothesis 1 (Improving political governance is negatively related to CO2 emissions); (ii) Hypothesis 2 (Increasing economic governance is negatively related to CO2 emissions) and (iii) Hypothesis 3 (Enhancing institutional governance is negatively related to CO2 emissions. Results of the tested hypotheses show that: the validity of Hypothesis 3 cannot be determined based on the results; Hypothesis 2 is not valid while Hypothesis 1 is partially not valid. The main policy implication is that governance standards need to be further improved in order for government quality to generate the expected unfavorable effects on CO2 emissions.

Governance and renewable energy consumption in Sub-Saharan Africa

“…… The last, but by no means least, regards the respect for citizens and the state of institutions that govern the interactions among them (Institutional Governance): rule of law and control of corruption" (Andres, Asongu & Amavilah, 2015: 1041. It is also worthwhile to emphasise that the theoretical linkages between the attendant governance dynamics and environmental quality are broadly consistent with Emmelin and Lerman (2008), Kurian and Ardakanian (2015), Masud, Nurunnabi and Bae (2018) and Asongu and Odhiambo (2021). In what follows, arguments for the testable hypotheses to be investigated in the empirical section are provided.…”

“…The policy literature on the relationships between governance and CO 2 emissions maintain that, inter alia, challenges in governance in Africa in particular and the world in general, are affecting economic development on several fronts, notably, inequality, water scarcity, poverty, food insecurity and environmental degradation (Emmelin and Lerman, 2008;Masud et al, 2018;Chemutai, 2009;Kurian and Ardakanian, 2015;Tchamyou, 2017Tchamyou, , 2019Tchamyou, , 2020Tchamyou et al, 2019;Asongu and Odhiambo, 2021). In the light of the attendant literature, concerns pertaining to governance rotate around the mismanagement of the environment essentially because most African countries are substantially constrained in terms of financial resources and technological knowledge, which to some extent are contingent on political will and good governance standards, notably, political and institutional governance; whereas Chemutai (2009) largely focuses on how countries that are more advanced in terms of availability of financial resources and quality of governance standards can help African countries in the direction of environmental sustainability.…”

“…In essence, contemporary literature on the nexus between governance and environmental sustainability in SSA is sparse. Third, while much has been documented on the positive relevance of governance in macroeconomic outcomes (Ajide & Raheem, 2016a, 2016b, the closest paper to this study in the literature is Asongu and Odhiambo (2021) which has investigated how enhancing governance is related to environmental sustainability. The findings of the study broadly show that increasing governance boosts carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the sampled countries.…”

Domestic energy consumption in Ghana: deprivation versus likelihood of access

“…In the light of the above, the positioning of this study, in view of providing answers to the underlying questions within the context of Ghana, contributes to the energy literature in view of providing policy makers with insights into how a country that is characterised by some of the world's worst energy grids systems can address the concerns of energy deprivation that have unfavourable consequences to both human and economic developments (Rafindadi, 2016; Jarrett, 2017; Balsalobre-Lorente et al , 2018; Asongu, 2018; Alola et al , 2019a, b; Saint Akadiri et al , 2019; Bekun and Agboola, 2019; Bekun et al , 2019a, b; Asongu and Odhiambo, 2020b, 2021). This study contributes to the knowledge in the area of household energy consumption.…”

Globalization, Governance and the Green Economy in Sub-Saharan Africa: Policy Thresholds

“…and CO2 emissions, with governance as a mechanism for the linkage. Accordingly, globalization has been documented to influence governance (Krueger, 1974;Bhagwati & Srinivasan, 1980;Bhagwati, 1982;Klitgaard, 1988;Gatti, 1999;Ades & Di Tella, 1999) and governance has also been established to affect CO2 emissions (Asongu & Odhiambo, 2021b).…”